Salesforce Inbox
A Salesforce Inbox is the set of email productivity features that Salesforce adds on top of the Outlook and Gmail integrations for Sales Cloud.
Definition
A Salesforce Inbox is the set of email productivity features that Salesforce adds on top of the Outlook and Gmail integrations for Sales Cloud. With an Inbox license, sales reps can track when emails are opened, schedule messages to send later, insert their calendar availability, and use shared text shortcuts, all without leaving their email client.
Inbox started as a separate paid product with its own desktop and mobile apps. Those standalone apps are older now, and the Inbox mobile app was retired in the Spring '25 release. The capabilities live on as a feature layer you switch on inside the Outlook and Gmail integrations, so the name still appears in Setup and on license assignments.
How Inbox sits on top of the email integrations
What Inbox actually adds
The free Outlook and Gmail integrations already let a rep view Salesforce records, log an email to a contact or opportunity, and create records from the side panel. Inbox is the paid upgrade that adds engagement and scheduling tools on top of that base. The headline features are email tracking, which tells a rep when a recipient opens a tracked email or clicks a link, and Insert Availability, which drops bookable time slots into an outgoing message so a prospect can pick a meeting time. Inbox also adds Send Later, letting a rep compose now and have the message go out at a chosen time, and text shortcuts, which expand a short typed code into a longer saved snippet. Reps get email templates and recommended connections surfaced in the same composer. None of this replaces logging or record creation. It extends them, so the rep stays in Gmail or Outlook while richer activity and engagement signals flow back into Salesforce.
From standalone product to feature layer
Inbox first shipped as its own product with dedicated desktop and mobile apps, separate from the lightweight email integrations. Over several releases Salesforce folded the Inbox feature set into the Outlook and Gmail integrations and into Lightning Experience email, so reps no longer needed a separate client to get tracking and scheduling. The standalone mobile app was retired in the Spring '25 release, and Salesforce pointed users toward the integration features and the Salesforce mobile app instead. This is why Inbox is best understood as legacy branding rather than a dead feature. The word Inbox still appears in Setup, in the Setup Assistant, and on the permission set licenses, but you are really turning on a capability tier inside a newer integration. If your documentation or training still talks about installing an Inbox app, that material is out of date and should point at the Outlook or Gmail integration setup instead.
Licensing and permission sets
Inbox features are gated behind a license, so enabling them is a two-part job. First an admin turns the capability on for the org, then assigns the right permission set license to each rep who needs it. Salesforce ships two relevant permission sets, Inbox With Einstein Activity Capture and Inbox Without Einstein Activity Capture. The choice depends on whether you also want automatic email and event capture running for those users. A single Inbox license covers a user across multiple connected mailboxes, so a rep with both a primary and a secondary email account does not need two licenses. Because the entitlement is per user, it is worth auditing who genuinely sends tracked outbound email before buying seats for an entire team. Reps who only read records from the side panel and log the occasional email do not need Inbox at all. The free integration already covers that, and you can layer Inbox onto just the subset of users who run real outbound cadences.
Email tracking, and its limits
Tracking is the feature reps ask about most, and it is also the one with the most caveats. When a rep tracks an email, Salesforce records open and link-click engagement and surfaces it as alerts and in the engagement view alongside the message. That signal helps a rep decide when to follow up. The limits matter though. Open tracking relies on a tracking pixel, so a recipient whose email client blocks remote images may not register as an open, and some privacy features can pre-fetch images and inflate counts. Internal forwarding and shared mailboxes can also muddy the data. Treat tracking as a directional indicator of interest, not a precise audit trail. Engagement that Inbox captures is distinct from the activity logging that Einstein Activity Capture performs. One tells you a prospect interacted with a specific send, the other keeps the broader email and calendar history in sync with Salesforce records. Many teams run both together.
Where Inbox ends and other tools begin
Inbox is deliberately scoped to individual rep productivity inside the mailbox. It does not build multi-step outreach sequences, it does not sync your whole email and calendar history automatically, and it does not manage a shared cadence across a team. Those jobs belong to other products. Sales Engagement, the successor to High Velocity Sales, owns cadences, call scripting, and the work queue that paces a rep through a day of outreach. Einstein Activity Capture owns background email and event sync so activities appear on the record timeline without manual logging. Inbox fills the gap in between, the moment of composing and sending one message and knowing whether it landed. Getting the boundary right avoids paying twice for overlapping capability. If a team needs structured sequences, license Sales Engagement. If they need hands-off activity sync, turn on Einstein Activity Capture. If reps mostly need tracking, scheduling, and availability inside Gmail or Outlook, Inbox is the targeted add-on.
Migration and what to do today
If your org still references the old standalone Inbox apps, the path forward is straightforward. Move users onto the Outlook or Gmail integration, enable Inbox features through the Setup Assistant, and assign the matching permission set license. Anyone who was on the retired Inbox mobile app should use the Salesforce mobile app and the browser-based integration for their tracking and scheduling needs. Before you migrate, take inventory. Confirm which reps actually use tracking, Send Later, and Insert Availability, because that list often turns out smaller than the number of assigned licenses. Check that your email server and browser support the current integration, since requirements have tightened over the years. Finally, decide whether each Inbox user should be on the With or Without Einstein Activity Capture permission set, based on whether you want automatic activity sync for them. Doing this audit during migration is the cheapest time to right-size your spend and clean up stale training material.
Turning on Inbox features for the Outlook and Gmail integrations
Inbox is not installed as a separate app anymore. You turn its features on inside the Outlook and Gmail integrations, then license the reps who need them. Here is the high-level path an admin follows.
- Open the Setup Assistant
In Setup, use Quick Find to open the Inbox Setup Assistant. This is the same place you configure the Outlook and Gmail integrations, since Inbox rides on top of them.
- Make Inbox available to users
Enable the setting that makes Inbox features available. This switches on the capability tier at the org level so individual users can then be granted access.
- Assign permission set licenses
Assign each rep either Inbox With Einstein Activity Capture or Inbox Without Einstein Activity Capture, depending on whether you also want automatic email and event sync for that user.
- Connect the mailbox
Have each rep connect their Microsoft or Google account from within Salesforce or from the integration panel. A single Inbox license covers a user across multiple connected mailboxes.
Grants Inbox productivity features plus automatic email and event capture, so activities sync to records without manual logging.
Grants Inbox productivity features only, for teams that handle activity logging another way or do not want background sync.
Turn on engagement tracking so reps see opens and link clicks as alerts and in the engagement view next to the message.
- Inbox is a paid add-on. The free Outlook and Gmail integrations cover record viewing, logging, and creation without it.
- The standalone Inbox mobile app was retired in Spring '25; point mobile users to the Salesforce mobile app and the integration instead.
- Open tracking uses a pixel, so blocked images or image pre-fetching can under- or over-count opens. Treat the numbers as directional.
- Do not confuse Inbox with Sales Engagement. Inbox handles single-message productivity; cadences and sequences live in Sales Engagement.
Trust & references
Cross-checked against the following references.
Straight from the source - Salesforce's reference material on Salesforce Inbox.
Hands-on resources to go deeper on Salesforce Inbox.
About the Author
Dipojjal Chakrabarti is a B2C Solution Architect with 29 Salesforce certifications and over 13 years in the Salesforce ecosystem. He runs salesforcedictionary.com to help admins, developers, architects, and cert/interview candidates sharpen their fundamentals. More about Dipojjal.
Test your knowledge
Q1. Is Salesforce Inbox still available?
Q2. What replaces Inbox's email sync?
Q3. What replaces Inbox's outreach tracking?
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